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cynefin framework

Where do you spend most of your time?

Not all work is the same and as a leader, allocating time to the right kind of work is essential. Time and again I’ve used the war-peace-prosperity model while thinking through this in the context of organization design. Please note that I’m using the term leader in the sense of a person that holds authority and accountability of some part of the business (rather than the more widely applicable idea of “leadership”). War War-like circumstances are chaotic. They need urgent and decisive action. You can think of war in both the active sense and the passive sense. In the passive… Read More »Where do you spend most of your time?

What is Digital Work?

In the last article we tried to define Digital Transformation as leveraging technology to drive your business strategy. This requires a fundamental change in the organization’s way of looking at technology and its ability to leverage technology to inform the strategy rather than just execute it! It is also imperative for the strategy to empower the technology to explore unknown possibilities. The role of technology This means that digital work is operating in the same space as business strategy does! And to operate in the complex-chaotic domains requires the “digital” part of the organization to be as entrepreneurial as the… Read More »What is Digital Work?

Digital Transformation through the lens of complexity

Digital Transformation is one of the most overused phrases of the past decade. And just like the blind men trying to describe the elephant, we only describe the parts of it that are most apparent to us. I’m aware of the same mistake that I’d be making if I tried to define it holistically. So, to me, the most meaningful way to describe it, is in context of the rest of this series. I’ve enjoyed complexity theory in the past few years after being introduced to the Cynefin framework by Dave Snowden. So I want to look at Digital Transformation… Read More »Digital Transformation through the lens of complexity

Digital Transformation : Understanding Organization Culture

In the last post, we discussed how culture is an important element of successful digital transformations. This means that we should stop looking at culture as a byproduct and instead start making it part of our digital transformation strategy. There are a few frameworks that I have found useful in thinking about org culture but like the blind men trying to describe the elephant, these frameworks are individually limited. It is by using them together that we might be able to get somewhere. So that’s my attempt over the next few posts. All models are wrong; some models are useful.… Read More »Digital Transformation : Understanding Organization Culture